Convert litres to barrels
1000 l is 6.2898 bbl, a little over six barrels of oil. Type the number of litres and the result in barrels appears straight away. The Barrel type switch under the fields lets you pick the oil barrel, the US or UK beer barrel, or the US barrel for liquids.
How many barrels are in 1,000 litres?
1,000 litres is 6.2898 barrels of oil. One litre is 0.0062898 of a barrel, so you either multiply the litres by that figure or divide them by the size of the barrel[1]. The formula is barrels = litres ÷ 158.987.
The 158.987 comes from the definition of the oil barrel, 42 US gallons of 3.785411784 litres each[2]. The beer barrel is different: 31 gallons in the US, which is 117.35 litres[3], and 36 imperial gallons in the UK, which is 163.66 litres[4]. The same 1,000 litres therefore makes 8.52 US beer barrels or 6.11 UK beer barrels. The US barrel for liquids holds 31½ gallons, or 119.24 litres[2], so 1,000 litres makes 8.39 of them. You choose between all four with the Barrel type switch under the fields.
To go from barrels back to litres, use the barrels to litres converter. It also covers where the 42 gallons came from and what a refinery makes out of one barrel.
Litres, cubic metres and barrels
The litre is the metric unit equal to one cubic decimetre, and 1,000 litres make one cubic metre, which oil statistics also call a kilolitre. You can move between the two in the litres to kilolitres converter. One cubic metre is 6.2898 barrels[1].
The barrel is not a container but an agreed quantity of 42 US gallons, written bbl, in which oil is priced and traded. Converting litres to barrels is what you do when figures from a metric country have to sit next to oil market data.
Canada shows how that works in practice. Canadian oil companies measure oil in cubic metres and report to Canadian governments in them, but convert to barrels for export and for American investors, using a nominal 6.2898 barrels per cubic metre[5].
Litres to barrels conversion table
| Litres | Oil | US beer | US liquids | UK beer |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 l | 0.0063 bbl | 0.0085 bbl | 0.0084 bbl | 0.0061 bbl |
| 5 l | 0.0314 bbl | 0.0426 bbl | 0.0419 bbl | 0.0306 bbl |
| 10 l | 0.0629 bbl | 0.0852 bbl | 0.0839 bbl | 0.0611 bbl |
| 20 l | 0.1258 bbl | 0.1704 bbl | 0.1677 bbl | 0.1222 bbl |
| 50 l | 0.3145 bbl | 0.4261 bbl | 0.4193 bbl | 0.3055 bbl |
| 100 l | 0.6290 bbl | 0.8522 bbl | 0.8386 bbl | 0.6110 bbl |
| 159 l | 1.0001 bbl | 1.3549 bbl | 1.3334 bbl | 0.9715 bbl |
| 200 l | 1.2580 bbl | 1.7043 bbl | 1.6773 bbl | 1.2221 bbl |
| 208 l | 1.3083 bbl | 1.7725 bbl | 1.7444 bbl | 1.2709 bbl |
| 500 l | 3.1449 bbl | 4.2608 bbl | 4.1932 bbl | 3.0551 bbl |
| 1,000 l | 6.2898 bbl | 8.5217 bbl | 8.3864 bbl | 6.1103 bbl |
| 5,000 l | 31.4491 bbl | 42.6084 bbl | 41.9321 bbl | 30.5513 bbl |
| 10,000 l | 62.8981 bbl | 85.2168 bbl | 83.8641 bbl | 61.1026 bbl |
| 30,000 l | 188.6943 bbl | 255.6504 bbl | 251.5924 bbl | 183.3077 bbl |
| 100,000 l | 628.9811 bbl | 852.1679 bbl | 838.6414 bbl | 611.0257 bbl |
| 1,000,000 l | 6,289.8108 bbl | 8,521.6791 bbl | 8,386.4144 bbl | 6,110.2569 bbl |
Is a 55-gallon drum a barrel?
No. The steel drum used for oils and chemicals holds 55 US gallons in the United States and is called a 200-litre drum elsewhere[5]. The 42-gallon oil barrel is a unit of measure, not a container that oil travels in[5]. A 55-gallon drum holds 208.2 litres, which is 1.31 oil barrels, and a 200-litre drum is 1.26 barrels.
The UK and its former dependencies used a drum of 44 imperial gallons, which comes to 200.03 litres, and today these drums are filled to 200 litres[5]. An IBC tote of 1,000 litres holds 6.29 oil barrels.
How many barrels of oil does a tanker carry?
Tanker capacity is given in barrels and depends on the class of ship and on the density of the cargo. A VLCC, the class that carries most of the world's crude, takes between 1.9 and 2.2 million barrels of WTI-type crude[6]. That is 302 to 350 million litres on one voyage.
Smaller ships mostly carry fuels. A General Purpose tanker takes 70,000 to 190,000 barrels of gasoline and a Medium Range tanker 190,000 to 345,000 barrels[6]. In litres that is 11.1 to 30.2 million for the first and 30.2 to 54.9 million for the second.
Which number formats does this converter accept?
| What you type | What the converter shows | How we read it |
|---|---|---|
| 1000 | 6.2898 bbl | We read a number with no separators as it stands, so this is a thousand litres. |
| 1,000 | 6.2898 bbl | Three digits after the comma make it a thousands separator, as in any English document. A note under the field shows the other possible reading, 1. |
| 1 000 | 6.2898 bbl | A space between the thousands, common in metric countries, is ignored, so we still count a thousand litres. |
| 2.5 | 0.01572 bbl | A point marks the decimal part in English, and that is how we read it. |
| 3/4 | 0.004717 bbl | We work out a fraction with a slash ourselves, so you do not have to turn it into a decimal first. |
| 1½ | 0.009435 bbl | We add the ½ sign to the number in front of it, so this is a litre and a half. |
| 200 l | 1.258 bbl | An l for litres pasted along with the number does no harm, because we keep the number and drop the letter. |
| 2 million | 12579.6215 bbl | We multiply by a million when the word million follows the number, so this is two million litres. |
Convert other units to Barrels
Convert Litres to other units
Sources
- Energy Conversion Tables — Canada Energy Regulator
- Handbook 44 – 2026, Appendix C. General Tables of Units of Measurement — National Institute of Standards and Technology
- 27 CFR 25.11 – Meaning of terms — Electronic Code of Federal Regulations
- English brewery cask units — Wikipedia
- Barrel (unit) — Wikipedia
- Oil tanker sizes range from general purpose to ultra-large crude carriers on AFRA scale — U.S. Energy Information Administration
- Annual Statistical Bulletin 2025, General Notes – Conversion factors — OPEC
- CONVERT function — Microsoft
Every figure in the tables was computed from the unit definitions and checked arithmetically before publication. Historical values and the names of local units come from the sources listed above.
Content last reviewed: · written and checked by the Arteon team
Frequently asked questions about litres and barrels
Is 159 litres exactly one barrel?
Almost. An oil barrel holds 158.987 litres, so 159 litres is 1.0001 barrels. Rounding to 159 is fine for a single barrel, but over a million barrels the gap grows to 12,705 litres.
How many metric tons of oil are in 1,000 litres?
About 0.86 tonnes. OPEC's standard figures put a cubic metre of crude, which is 1,000 litres, at 0.858 tonnes and one barrel at 0.136 tonnes[7]. A given crude can be lighter or heavier, because its weight depends on its density.
How many barrels is a 50-litre beer keg?
A 50-litre keg is 0.43 of a US beer barrel or 0.31 of a UK one. Measured against the oil barrel it also comes to 0.31, because the oil barrel and the UK beer barrel differ by less than 5 litres.
How do I convert litres to barrels in Excel?
Use the CONVERT function, CONVERT(number, from_unit, to_unit). The litre has the code "l" and the oil barrel "barrel"[8]. The formula =CONVERT(A1,"l","barrel") turns the litres in cell A1 into barrels. Excel has no beer barrels and no barrel for liquids, so for those divide the litres by 117.35, 119.24 or 163.66.
Do you have a question or a suggestion?
Write to us if the converter is missing a barrel type you need, or if any number looks out of date.